How To Talk To Your Daughter About Sex And Sexually Transmitted Disease
Although teen pregnancy has declined in recent years and there is increased awareness about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and use of contraception, girls are participating in sexual activities other than intercourse at increasingly younger ages. Imagine what it’s like for girls to come of age at a time of “Sex and the City,” when oral sex is the subject of newspapers, when teenage girls are the subjects of pornographic sites, and when underwear is a fashion statement. Everything, it seems, is sexualized.
Because of this early end to our daughters’ childhood and the increased sexualization of our culture, girls find themselves in social situations for which they aren’t prepared. The “in-your-face” sexuality of today’s culture is confusing for young girls. Just think of Samantha on “Sex and the City,” who is phobic about intimacy but addicted to sex. Jerry, the father of three teenage girls, said, “No matter what show you turn on, someone is tearing somebody else’s clothes off. Sex has become another throwaway.”
In the recent past, girls fit into one of two categories: Madonna or whore, angel or temptress, girl next door or slut, clean or dirty. Both sets of categories are fantasies; neither describes a complete person. As Liza Mundy writes in “Sex Sensibility,” these categories are “yet another way of sorting girls, setting them at odds with one another. Modern scare tactics have lent a new vocabulary—even a fake veneer of legitimacy—to ancient, pernicious stereotypes.” Because of the pejorative characterization of a girl who has sexual feelings, girls learn that finding pleasure in their sexuality is wrong. A boy who is sexually active has status; he’s a “player.”
Girls and boys should be held to the same standards. Many girls feel forced to have sexual experiences before they are ready. Parents with whom we spoke are afraid for their daughters. It isn’t that parents expect their daughters to remain chaste; they just want them to understand that sex is a mature act, to be shared with someone who cares for and respects them.
Whether we like it or not, our daughters are, according to Joan Brumberg’s The Body Project, “growing up with an expanded repertoire of erotic possibilities.” Many girls are becoming as aggressive about sex as boys are. This is a very difficult concept for parents to accept. With different sexual activities, such as oral sex, treated as casual acts, it’s no wonder that parents feel out of sync with their teenage daughters. One parent said, “I think my daughter has convinced herself that oral sex is not an intimate act and she can still be a virgin.” It appears that girls are engaging in oral sex more frequently to placate boys and alleviate the pressure to do more.
Girls told us that they perform oral sex to satisfy their boyfriends and avoid the possibility of unsafe sex. As with other sexual behavior, a double standard exists with oral sex as well. Many teenage girls mistakenly believe that oral sex is safe sex. This is where dialogue and open communication are so essential. Not talking about sex does not protect your daughter from being sexually active. The converse is true as well: talking about sex does not mean that she will be sexually active. Sex is an uncomfortable topic for parents to deal with, regardless of whether we are liberal or conservative. As a result, we give girls many mixed messages.
Sex is also a less than comfortable topic for our girls. In fact, nearly half of young women recently surveyed by Mary Katherine Hutchinson and Teresa Cooney in Family Relations reported feeling somewhat or very uncomfortable discussing sexuality with their parents. However, the same young women reported wishing their mothers and fathers had shared more information with them about sexuality. It makes good sense to discuss sexuality with our daughters. As Brent Miller reports in Families Matter, open communication between parents and teenagers has been linked to delaying first intercourse and increasing the likelihood of contraceptive use.
Fathers particularly have difficulty with their daughters’ sexuality. Many mothers recounted stories of how differently their husbands perceived the way their daughters dressed. Janice, the mother of 14- year-old Alyssa, said, “This year Alyssa tried a bathing suit on for her dad, and his jaw almost hit the ground. She looked gorgeous. I looked at her wistfully, wishing I could still turn heads like she would. My husband looked at me, puzzled, and said, ‘You aren’t going to let her go out like that are you?’ It was the first time he sounded like a sitcom father. He was really uncomfortable with her sexuality, realizing that she looked sexy and knowing that boys and men might notice.” Often, dads more than mothers have a hard time visualizing their daughters being intimate.
As uncomfortable as you may feel, you need to teach your daughter about the duality of sexuality so she can have a safe context in which to explore desire. Girls are taught to keep a rein on the sexual advances of boys, yet they aren’t taught how to acknowledge and manage their own sexual feelings. Deborah Tolman says, in Dilemmas of Desire: Teenage Girls Talk About Sexuality, that society gives a girl the unfair choice between connection with herself and her body, including sexual feelings, and denying her body pleasure.
Today’s parents came of age at a time when they worried that unprotected sex would lead to pregnancy. Our daughters have come of age in a world where sex can lead to AIDS and death. Ellen, the mother of three teenage daughters, said, “When I was a teenager, my fear about being sexual was focused on worrying if I’d ruin my reputation as a ‘nice girl’ or get pregnant. Now I teach my daughters about date rape and disease. Since the late 1970s sex can kill you, and I worry whether my daughters will be casual about protecting themselves.” Ellen is right; acronyms that we never heard of—STDs, HIV, and AIDS—are now in our vocabulary, and the adolescent community is not as knowledgeable as it needs to be about these risks if young people are to be safe.
Parents worry that when their daughters acknowledge their sexual desires, the girls will be more vulnerable to danger. In contrast, when girls begin to trust their own minds and bodies, they gain a stronger sense of self, which will help them to make safer decisions. In addition, Liza Mundy claims in her article in the Washington Post that teens “who have a strong, healthy relationship with at least one parent, where they can talk about what’s on their mind and what they’re dealing with are less likely to have early sexual experiences.” To be able to identify their sexual feelings and to listen to their bodies are significant responsibilities girls must undertake as they mature.